Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales didn't know he liked to play chess until he read it on the online encyclopedia he helped to create.
Even Wales is sometimes the victim of information vandalism on Wikipedia, the Internet phenomenon which started in 2001 and is now written and edited by thousands of anonymous contributors.
"When I read the story of my life on Wikipedia, I think it's quite funny and odd because major parts of my life aren't mentioned," the former options trader told reporters on a trip to Japan.
"For a short period of time someone wrote in the article about me, 'In his spare time he enjoys playing chess with his friends.' It's not a very vicious thing to say, it just happens to not be true," he said.
Wales isn't the only one to have found some unexpected information about themselves on Wikipedia, the self-policing website described by Wales as an attempt to give free access to the sum of all human knowledge.
Former Robert Kennedy aide John Seigenthaler famously logged onto Wikipedia to find an article suggesting that he may have been involved in the assassinations of both Robert F. Kennedy and John F. Kennedy.
More recently the site has been hit by revelations that a prolific Wikipedia editor "Essjay", who claimed to be a professor, was actually a 20-something college dropout who used false credentials.
He has since been asked to resign, but -- in the true spirit of the website -- even "Essjay" now has his own Wikipedia entry.
The site, which has a core of volunteer Wikipedians who trawl the many pages for inaccuracies, aims to offer everyone free access to information, but its biggest strength is also one of its biggest weaknesses.
Although its accuracy is reportedly on a par with the Encyclopaedia Britannica, even Wales says college students should not rely on Wikipedia alone, although he adds that telling them not to visit Wikipedia "is like telling them not to listen to rock and roll."
But it is often the most controversial subjects that have the most balanced entries, he adds.
"The community is really aggressive about defending our neutrality policy. People are constantly reviewing articles," said Wales.
"In terms of more subtle errors or more subtle information, obviously it becomes more difficult, but then it gets into the very complex area of editorial judgement," he said.
"In general, on highly controversial topics... we end up with a pretty balanced article, because what happens is people from competing sides have to write in such a way which is agreeable not only for themselves but to the person on the other side."
With more than five million articles in 250 languages from English and Arabic to Tagalog and even Choctaw, Wikipedia says it is now used every day by hundreds of thousands of people around the world.
Since its launch in 2001, it has become a powerful symbol of a new generation of Internet service based on collaboration and information-sharing.
Wales has also been on the other end of the misinformation controversy: in 2005 he was criticised for editing his own biography page on Wikipedia, apparently removing references to Larry Sanger as co-founder of the website.
Wales also now hopes to launch a search engine to rival Google and Yahoo.
"The idea that Google has some edge because they've got super duper rocket scientists may be a little antiquated now," he said.
He even dreams of starting a free mobile telephone network one day, but he also believes Wikipedia still has room for improvement.
"I don't know how good we can get. Right now we basically have a desire to be Britannica or better quality. We don't reach that in a lot of areas. We do reach it in some areas. As long as people are using it I'm happy," he said.
